Day 5 – Friday: Mentor, My Mentor

This week has been both fun and a real challenge for me. I hope it was for you as well. It’s been interesting reading all of the private email and phone calls I get about the topics. I often wonder why y’all are afraid to post them into comments. You have some great ideas and thoughts.

That is what leads us to the subject of the last day of the Week of Living Consciously – your ideas. All of the subjects this week as well as every week come from your ideas. All I do is assemble what others have taught me over the years and try to make them accessible. I read a lot, I listen a lot and I practice a lot but there is one catalyst that has moved me further than any other, a mentor.

If you have never been either a mentor or a protege you are missing out on an incredible opportunity. To meet with someone regularly that is interested in helping you grow along your area of interest is more valuable than any single book that has no clue about you. The sage advice of someone that has been there and done that has saved me from doing some really stupid things.

I typically try and make myself available to mentor 3 or 4 relationships at any one time, dedicating anywhere from an hour a week to an hour a month. I also try and find a mentor for me as well. Often these relationships come from work or church. Occasionally I receive a request as a result of a friendship outside of these two areas.

The hard part is getting these realtionships going. If you wanted a mentor right now where would you turn? If you wanted to mentor someone else who would you tell? Would you walk up to someone who really looks like they could use help and say “Hey, I think you could use me?” It is always difficult for me to setup the next relationship.

I have been thinking a lot about how to try and solve this issue on a small scale. It’s an idea in the back of my head that needs a lot more thought and requires your help. To see if it will work I need to first see if there is any interest and if so how much. In other words I need enlightened guinea pigs.

So the challenge today is actually quite simple. You just have to decide if it’s something you are interested in or not.

Today’s Challenge
If you are even somewhat interested in establishing a mentoring relationship, either as a mentor or a protege or both I need you to let me know. I have created a temporary email box at thestrandedstarfish@comcast.net.
Drop me a note with your preferred email address and I will get back to you soon with how you may be able to help change the lives of others as well as yourself.